Today's Dues And Tomorrow's News
by SuperSandri
Summary: In 1947, a red scarfed reporter finds herself scouring the streets of Downtown Toronto to find a story worth giving to the local paper. She soon finds a story worth telling in the form of the city's local newsies, each of them with tales to be told. The reporter ends up finding the most intriguing tale from an ashy-haired cigar-loving newsie by the name of Jean. Jeankasa. 1940s AU
1. Chapter 1

**Today's Dues And Tomorrow's News**

**Pairings:** Jean/Mikasa, and sprinkles of various others.

**Rating:** T for swearing.

**Setting:** Downtown Toronto, 1947.

**Word Count:** +16,000 (split into parts for convenience)

**A/n:** This was initially made for the Jeankasa week prompt, AU, and if you cannot tell, I went all out with it. I've had the idea of a Jeankasa fic set on the movie/musical Newsies in my mind for a long long time. There are subtle references to songs from the musical scattered around the fic. If you know the stage show well enough and can point them out, you deserve some extra waffle points.

I did a lot of research when writing this fic, and please not that I really did try to not romanticize a time and place where a world wide war just ended. If anything offends you in anyway, message me, because I would like to know.

On a more brighter note, I hope you enjoy my newsies AU. For a while, I have been pushing for Jeankasa to adopt a new little nickname I dub: "Horsecuddles," because Jean will never hear the end of the horse jokes, and Mikasa is probably very very cuddly on the inside.

Hope you like it! Leave a review if you can and let me know what you think!

* * *

The first thing she noticed about him was his voice. In a few words, he was able to show an interesting contrast between him and the other newsboys of the city. When he spoke, he lacked a distinctive big city feel to his voice; which differentiated from all the other newsboys who seemed to put an unnecessary 's' at the end of certain words or always seemed to enjoy not saying the last letter in words that ended with 'ing.' But still, each word that came from his mouth still had an element of pompousness to it, as if he was way more important than he actually seemed.

"The name's Jean, Jean Kirschtein. And who might you be, sweetheart?"

"Ackerman, just Ackerman," Mikasa responded, keeping her eyes focused on the Toronto Star's main building and her words short.

The so-called Jean nodded his head, "Well, 'just-Ackerman,' if you don't mind me asking, what's a dame like you doing in front of the Star's building today?"

"Well," Mikasa started, her voice growing just a little bit firm. "This _dame_ over here would prefer that you mind your own business. Think you can go back to your... posse." There wasn't too many other word options to describe the fact that this Jean guy seemed to be walking with a small group of newsies just like him, the signature caps on their heads and bags by their sides symbolizing the bond they had formed with each other.

Jean himself stood out a bit appearance wise. It wasn't surprising for him to appear very shabby; an obviously aged tweed coat wrapped around his body, the dusty cigar placed safely behind his ear, scuffed-up and dirty-looking marks on his work boots, and a tattered markings on his signature newscap, which sat on a head of two-toned hair that seemingly stuck up at the back.

One of the newsboys behind Jean spoke up, right after hobbling to Jean's proximity on a dusty-looking wooden crutch. He was short, skinny, bald, and had his right ankle sickled. Despite how he was presented, this newsboy spoke with pride and energy, as if he didn't even know that he had to rely on a crutch to move a step. "Hey! us newsies ain't no posse! We's a family!"

"Yeah, a wolf pack, a pride, an army, all that kinda stuff," another one added in. This newsboy was not a newsboy at all, rather, a newsgirl to be more precise. She was taller than the skinheaded newsboy with her brown hair tied back in a tall pony tail. For some reason, aside from the empty sack in her hand, she also held a small bread roll in her grip with a few bite marks in it.

Mikasa shrugged her shoulders, re-focusing her gaze back onto the building, "Thanks for telling me."

"You waitin' for the an issue? At this hour? Which one? Morning or afternoon?" yet another newsboy added in. This one was taller and a bit stocky looking. Freckles covered his cheeks while a large black patch covered his right eye. It looked a bit out of place for him to have an eye patch, but Mikasa figured that this newsboy either wore it because something happened to his eye in the past, or he just wanted to look cool.

"It can't be the morning paper," the so called Jean added in. "At this point of day, there aren't too many people up for buying the morning edition. Most of us probably sold enough to the city already."

"I'm not technically waiting for an issue to be printed," Mikasa added, her replies mainly remaining flat and mundane. She preferred to focus on the Star's front door as opposed to conversing with a few newsboys in the early evening. Then again, considering the profession of who walked out of the door, Mikasa shouldn't have been acting in such a way to the newsies.

Armin walked out more timidly than Eren did, his cap sliding in every direction on his little head while Eren's seemed to fit perfectly on his. Eren was not as timid-looking as Armin, but he looked just as disappointed as his best friend was.

"Turns out the whole thing about the Star buying back the papers that didn't get sold was just a lie," Eren stated. "I really thought they would though."

"I told you that buying that many papers in the morning wasn't a good idea," Armin added on.

Mikasa nodded her head, looking over at the pile of spare unsold papers sitting in the fabric of Eren's carrying sack, "What are you going to do with all those then? Did you make enough profit to compensate?"

Eren shrugged his shoulders, "I think so…"

Armin's eyes looked down to the papers as well, calculating calmly before making a his judgement, "Well, assuming you charged the newsboy's prices, I think you'd be good, Eren. But with the amount of papers you took, you didn't make a profit today. You actually lost some money, Eren."

Eren made a grumbling noise of frustration, "Oh, fuck, are you kidding me? What am I gonna do now? Armin, think you can help me out?"

"How?" Armin said honestly. On his first week of paper selling, Armin still needed to study up on the instruction manual that came with being a newsie. Essentially, he still needed some time to memorize the tricks and tips of the trade because no one bothered to write all this shit down.

"Well, uh…" Mikasa thought in search of a solution. She grabbed one of the papers, "Maybe a fisherman could wrap something with one of these…"

The same pompous and confident tone that greeted her moments ago suddenly spoke up. "That's an idea, but it'd be a waste of a good paper…" Jean had approached the trio silently and had reached over to grab one of the papers in Eren's bag. He flipped it open and read the headline, sighing just a bit when he remembered how ridiculous he sounded that morning when he screamed about a flying fish taking down NYC in the city's financial district, "… but not a waste of a good headline."

Mikasa raised an eyebrow at Jean, growing slightly suspicious at his sudden forwardness, "What are you gonna do with that? Sell it?"

"Maybe," Jean claimed as he grabbed the remaining papers from Eren's bag and turned over to his friends. "Yo! Over here!"

Armin looked confused, Eren felt curious, and Mikasa was still as suspicious as ever towards the actions of the ashy-haired newsie in a tweed coat. From what she could see, he appeared to be putting the remaining papers into the carrying bags of his friends, giving them all two each.

"Sell it somehow before you all get home, okay?" Jean said to them in surprisingly trustful voice. "Then give half the profit back to the shrimp, got it?"

The taller freckled newsie smiled and nodded his head towards Jean, the smaller cripple looked energetic and motived, while the taller brown-haired girl wiped a few crumbs from her face and took the paper in her hands. There were 2 others who followed Jean, but the tall brown haired boy and the stocky blonde boy only nodded sternly, the blonde one looking just a little more confident than his comrade.

Jean turned around with a confident and assured expression on his face, two remaining papers still in his hands. "Problem solved."

"How so?" Armin questioned.

Jean pointed back, "See, I got my buddies here to take one paper each and promise to sell it somehow before they get home. Then the next day, they'll give you back half of their profit."

Eren's face fell, "Only half?"

"It's better than nothing," Jean shrugged off. "Plus, there's a few suckers guaranteed to buy an issue if you look hard enough. Workers who work nights and have to go home in the morning, you know."

Eren nodded his head in hesitation, only partially agreeing to Jean's idea. Armin seemed slightly more optimistic than his best friend, "Well, half the profit's better than nothing…"

"Definitely," Jean pointed out. "But hey, don't sweat it. It's just a rookie mistake."

"How do you know I'm a rookie?" Eren asked somewhat offended.

"The dozen unsold papers is a good sign," Jean pointed out.

Mikasa scoffed, taking one of the papers in Jean's hand to read for herself, "They're probably unsold because the Star prints nothing useful these days." She flipped through the pages unamused, "You'd think a city this big would have more than gossip to tell the world."

"What's your deal with the Star?" Jean asked, taking his paper back to roll it back into a more neater-looking roll. "There something I need to know for this to make sense?"

"Not entirely," Mikasa muttered. "There's just a thousand stories hidden in this town and it's actually painfully stupid for a paper with this much power to just ignore them all."

The honestly harsh words made Jean's face turn into an expression of hesitant fear, followed by an amused scoff. "Well, that's the Star for you; cheaper than the bread the bakers throw out at the end of the day."

The female and brown-haired newsie behind him spoke up, "That bread's still pretty good though."

"I'll await the day the Star puts out a headline that'll actually sell well," Mikasa decided stoically, yet, with a small element of patience for the time it would take for her decision to actually happen.

"Hey, headlines don't sell papers; newsies sell papers," Jean stated willfully, playing around with the rolled issue in his hand. "Speaking of which, I believe I have something to sell off to a sucker." He glanced to Eren, "I'll give you what this'll get tomorrow, deal?"

"Sure," Eren said with an unenthusiastic thumbs up. His career of being a newsie so far wasn't exactly being as profitable as he believed.

"See you tomorrow, I assume," Armin spoke up in a voice that implied that he was trying to be friendly to Jean, but instead, he seemed to come off as just a little timid in the presence of the scruffy-haired and slightly pompous newsie.

"Of course," Jean said simply, glancing down at Armin. His attention shifted as the moment ended, Jean's glance moving and focusing on the girl in a red scarf with awfully strong opinions about the Toronto Star, "So, just-Ackerman, would I be seeing you more around this area in the future as well?"

A look up at the Star's building followed; Mikasa's eyes observing every window from the top to the bottom, with a particular focus sticking onto the Editor-In-Chief's office. Looking back to Jean, Mikasa decided to answer as honestly as she could: "Most definitely."

* * *

Mikasa kept her coat secured onto her body and her scarlet scarf bound around her neck just a little bit tighter. It was a good idea to do so in the current time of year, since winter was just starting to wear off the spring would slowly be able to warm up the region into a toasty summer. Eventually, at one point or another. She hoped the warm weather would start kicking in soon.

An evening like this was especially cold, a testament to the fact being apparent when Mikasa felt a certain numbness creeping onto her fingers. Determination fuelled her actions as she blew some breath on her hands to keep them warm before reaching back down to grab her pen and write in her pocket book.

**April 19, 1947, Toronto Waterfront,**

_7:45 PM, Fruedenberg enters alley way and ducks into supposedly abandoned warehouse, followed by Deliss._

_7:52 PM, Feulner enters with suspicious looking bag. _

_7:58 PM, Suspicious looking bearded man enters building as well. Name: Unknown._

_8:00 PM, Door of warehouse's clicked, door is possibly locked._

Dead set on getting to the bottom of the story, Mikasa prepped her set up atop her hiding place with her writing hand ready to jot down any scrap of information she could find, and her remaining hand keeping close to the boxy brick-like camera with a fresh film exposure ready for a photo she had placed beside her.

_8:05 PM, nothing's happened so far except silence. _

_8:10 PM, still nothing. _

_8:15 PM, still nothing. _

_8:20 PM, a cat mewed somewhere._

_8:25 PM, still nothing. _

_8:30 PM, night just got significantly colder. _

"Well, hello again!"

Mikasa knew she would have fallen asleep in about 5 more minutes had she not heard the sound of someone's voice addressing her. She also knew that she would have fallen off the empty fire escape box and hit the ground with a loud thud had she not reached out and braced herself on the metal structure.

A curse escaped her mouth as she knocked the camera off the fire escape in her startled reaction, "Shit!"

Thankfully, the guy who had the ability to startle her so easily also had the reflexes to snatch the camera out of the air and save it from crashing on the ground.

"Well, that would've been nasty," Jean remarked as he looked at the fancy-looking device in his hands. "Good catch, wasn't it?"

Mikasa peeped down the fire escape's ladder to identify who it was, and seemed barely surprised when she recognized him easily; from his constantly messy hair to the fresh cigar settled behind his ear. "Oh, it's you."

"A 'your welcome' is usually courteous to say at this moment, but I'll accept that too," Jean replied, walking over to the ladder of the metal structure and managing to climb it with a camera in one of his hands.

Once he was atop, Mikasa took back her camera wordlessly and quickly started inspecting it for nicks and scratches. "What'd you come up here for?"

Jean pointed to the vast and complex system of fire escape walk ways and ladders that were built between the two warehouses of the area, the entire structure being large enough to allow one to travel throughout the alley way without even setting foot on the ground. For something only meant to be used in the case of an emergency, the metal walk ways made for an excellent place to lounge in. "This is my route home. Sweet, isn't it?" He clicked his tongue at her, "But I think the real question here is what are you doing up here?" He glanced at the camera, "You stalking someone?"

"Nobody's worth wasting film over," Mikasa confirmed. The next words she spoke came out in a matter that seemed snobby and almost arrogant, "I happen to be on business up here tonight."

"Business, huh?" Jean repeated. Judging from the shadiness of the area and the recent activities going on in the city's nooks and crannies that no one ever saw, being in this place on 'business' was completely understandable. "Good for you. Don't worry though, if I see the cops, I'll tell them I never saw you here and I won't tell them who you're in cahoots with, cool?"

Mikasa raised an eyebrow, "What? No! Not _that _kind of business." She waved her pocket book in his face erratically, "I'm reporting, you doll-dizzy horseface."

"Whoa there, little miss red scarf, I was just joshing you," Jean said in amusement. "Us newsies don't get too much time to have fun, so we tend to joke about random things."

"Well, I don't joke."

"Ever?"

"Nope."

"Not at all?"

"Nope."

"Never?"

"No."

Jean shrugged his shoulders in defeat, as he realized that it was best to come to terms with the fact that he would never make this Ackerman girl laugh. "Welp, to each their own, I guess. What do you got in the book so far?"

Mikasa straightened up and opened her book in a pompous fashion, "Before I was rudely interrupted by a scruffy-looking newsboy, I got down…" A quick glance towards her notes quickly alerted Mikasa that the only headline she would manage to write with her info would be: Grumpy Girl Wastes Her Time On A Friday Night. "… nothing."

Jean nodded as he took the cigar from behind his ear into his hand. He then pulled a metal device from his pocket and used it to cut the end off the cigar; all before grabbing a match, striking it, and lighting the end of his toro. "Sounds like a promising article, just-Ackerman," Jean chuckled before putting the cigar between his teeth and flashing her a cheeky smile.

Mikasa rolled her eyes, whether it be at his remark, him, or his cigar, "You know, I was told to never talk to strangers for my own safety." And perhaps comfort.

Jean let out a laugh, "You'd make a terrible reporter then."

"Don't you have some sort of posse to be with?" Mikasa brought up suddenly.

Jean shook his head, "Naw, they all went home; as am I. Shouldn't you be heading off too?"

Mikasa checked her pocket watch and mentally cursed at the time; not even Eren and Armin stayed out this late. "Probably."

Jean nodded and turned towards the system of fire escape routes, "See you later then."

"Hopefully not ever," Mikasa replied a little too brutally. The subject changed quickly before the words could make any damage at least. "But hey, do you know how to get back to The Annex from here?"

Jean raised an eyebrow, "You live in the Annex?"

"Yes, I live there," Mikasa answered quite simply. "With Eren."

Looking surprised, Jean had to take the cigar out of his mouth to better speak, "Hold up, you live with Jaeger…" He halted his words suddenly with a mildly panicked expression on his face. He added onto the end with haste, "… in the Annex?"

Suspiciously, she raised her eyebrow just slightly, "Yeah, I just said that…"

Jean ruffled his hair by rubbing his cap on his head somewhat awkwardly, "I noticed." He pulled himself out of his awkward state quickly, "But hey, if you guys live in the frickin' Annex, why's Jaeger trying to be a newsie?"

"Long story short: He wants to work before he turns 18," Mikasa simplified. "Eren's gonna go to the army, for some reason."

Jean raised an eyebrow in regards to Eren's ambitions and goals, "The army? Really? I don't know about you, but isn't the whole need for an army kind of gone by this point?"

The truth remained that it was, but Mikasa could only shrug her shoulders at his reply. She wasn't one to get into the way of Eren's life goals. "His choice, not mine. But anyway, do you know how I could get back there before my fingers freeze off?"

Jean nodded, getting back to the main subject as he pointed over to the pathway above the cement created by the fire escape, "Yeah. It's a bit of a walk, but I could get you through here to a street car."

Mikasa nodded, "That'll do."

"Follow," Jean instructed simply as he turned to the walk way above the alleyway and began the journey to the other side.

Mikasa followed his steps, the padding of her oxfords synching up with the click of Jean's work boots against the metal strips that formed the fire escape.

To his credit, Jean was correct on the structure being 'sweet.' It was not unlike a secret place above the city streets smushed between two buildings, but some how, as intricate as a jigsaw puzzle and as satisfying as completing one.

"So Jaeger wants to be in the army?" Jean said randomly, the cigar in his mouth wagging from his lips as he spoke.

"When Eren turns 18, yes," Mikasa replied quickly. Her voice turned a slight bit defensive, "But it's none of your business, really."

Jean chuckled, leading her up a metal stairwell and leading her across on a long thin platform above the streets, "Whoops, my bad. Just trying chat and all. Is it bad for me to talk about possible career options with people my age?" With his 17th passing a week and a half ago, Jean knew he had to think quick before the year passed over like a bird flying above the skyline.

"It's not," Mikasa decided. But then again, it wasn't her position in the first place to tell her foster brother's goals and ambitions to someone who was essentially just a stranger on the street. Talking about the future interested her though. "But with how you're talking about the army, I doubt that you'd want to enlist."

"I don't have a goddamn death wish, just-Ackerman. People can tell me to 'Do it for my country' as much as they want, but they aren't ever gonna see me in a helmet on the battlefield," Jean claimed like it was a hard fact. "You know where I was when shit went down? Here."

"Hiding like a coward, I assume?" Mikasa wonder out loud, in a rather cold voice to add. Though, assuming that Jean was just as old as she was, he was most likely about 9 years old when the war started.

Shrugging his shoulders, he passively complied, "Well, if that's how you want to see it." The street lights of the road ahead became more visible as they walked, causing Jean to halt at one ladder placed by the end of one walk way. Clicking his tongue, he signalled to jump down. "And hey, say what you want about me, but that time was when I learned how to deliver papers like a real champ."

As she watched Jean climb down the ladder, she raised an eyebrow. But suddenly, it made sense. In an age of war, it made plenty of sense that any esteemed paper would no doubt have to report important details and events to the public via the written word. Climbing down herself, she responded: "How old were you when you starting selling papers?"

"Not a day over 10, I believe," Jean replied before taking in a quick inhale of his cigar. "It was a pretty good time to be selling them too. Peeps were buying them left and right."

"Well, obviously," Mikasa said in a condescending tone as she landed on the sidewalk beside him.

"They're selling more normally now," he added on as he walked towards the end of the alley way. "It'd be swell if people read a bit more than listening to the radio or whatever, but hey, you get what you get. I'm sure I'll have enough savings by my 18th at this rate. Actually, I might have enough right now…"

Mikasa raised an eyebrow, "What on earth would you be saving for?" She spoke with the same common snobbish tone that she seemed to have in regards to the scruffy newsboy at her disposal speaking smartly for once. As rude as it was, Mikasa did think a bit lowly of the charismatic but cocky and skirt-chasing Jean Kirschtein.

"Well, I can't stay a newsie forever, can't I?" Jean said in a confident and relaxed tone as he shrugged his shoulders. "But then again, I'm sure papers would sell just as well in the city of Van as they do here."

Mikasa looked at him questionably at first, but it was only a matter of short seconds when her memory identified what city he was talking about, and it all made sense to her. "Wait, are you talking about Vancouver? You wanna go all the way out west?"

Jean laughed, "Does that bother you?" He shook off the laugh quickly, looking down with an amused smile on his face. It was probable that he had told the same old story plenty of times before. "I know it's a bit far, but listen, everyone I've met who's been there before talk about how open and free it feels. You're so close to the sea that you could taste it every morning when you open up a window to let the breeze in. No more of this mushed up city life, living between two buildings and all that shit. And they say that the mountains are taller than the highest skyscraper in any town."

Observantly, Mikasa managed to notice a slight optimistic glow beaming in Jean's eyes, but some how, mixed in with a small bit of carelessness. Despite it all, she wasn't deterred from producing an amused smirk on her face in response to his goal ranting. "I hear it rains a lot over there, what's your plan for that?"

"I'll buy an umbrella," Jean answered simply.

She rolled her eyes, "Pffft, that'll keep you safe. Tell me though, why Vancouver? Out of all the places in this country, why there?"

"I have a few more reasons," Jean informed with a sly crooked smile on his face. "Plus, I hear that The Vancouver Sun actually buys back the papers that the newsies don't sell that day instead of just leaving us to rot like the Star does."

Mikasa could still recall Eren complaining about his small debt caused by the Star's policy once or twice in the last few days. In doing so, she understood Jean's words with ease. "Good point, it's actually ridiculous that the Star doesn't treat the newsies well. And the profits you guys make would be definitely higher if the Star grew a pair and bought their papers back." Armin and Eren both did their fair share of ranting about the downside of being a newsie to her whenever they found the time to hang out. From the weather to the foot blisters, Mikasa was honestly a little puzzled that Jean seemed to proud to be in such a profession. "Have you tried forming a union?"

The clicking of his work boots and the padding of her oxfords halted when they got to the end of the alley. Looking over across the street, Jean pointed at one of the designated stops by the street car rails on the sidewalk. "I'm sure if you take that ride, you'll get to the Annex soon. Got it?"

"Yeah, thanks," Mikasa agreed.

"See you around, just-Ackerman," Jean bid adieu politely with a tip of his cap.

"I have a first name, you know," she stated out of nowhere in a tone that would imply her being fed up with his little pet name. She turned to him with the intentions of looking him in the eye with an expression still as stoic as ever, but with a small softer element to it.

"It's Mikasa," she stated firmly but wearily. "Mikasa Ackerman." The hesitation in her voice was small and easy to miss, but it was most definitely there.

"Mikasa, huh?" Jean commented, seemingly interested in a name that he most definitely hadn't heard before in his 17 years of life. It rolled off his tongue with ease, more smoothly than the best cigar a boy on the street could swipe. "Neat name."

A very subtle shrug echoed through her body language, "Not a lot of people think so."

The sound of the street car approaching became audible in the area. A glance ahead alerted Mikasa that her ride back home to the Annex was approaching the stop. "I gotta go. Thanks for getting me here."

"No problem, just-Ackerman," said Jean. Mikasa flashed him a grumpy looking glare when she realized that he was probably going to ignore her first name and there was no point in fighting it.

"See you soon."

The final words being stated, Mikasa left him and ran towards the street car stop.

* * *

**To be continued in part 2!**

**Oh, and better put this here before it's too late...**

**Disclaimer: I do not own a thing.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Here's part 2! I hope you enjoy!**

* * *

Mikasa could only hope that she was in the right place. If the address Eren wrote down the slip of paper for her was correct, then the small dusty-yet-charming drug store with a sign saying _Berner's_ on the front was the prime hang-out for all the working class youth around the east side of Toronto.

Armin had made the story behind the shop seem pleasant. The owner was a newsboy in his youth and pooled up all of his savings and earnings from his job to open up his own place. It was predominantly frequented by newsboys and other working youth, but was open to anyone in need of a refreshment.

If her failed attempts at becoming a reporter could be considered work, then Mikasa could possibly pass as a working youth.

Her initial thoughts of the store were the expectations that the place would be just like any other kind of teenage hangout; vibrant, loud, and crazy. But immediately, the store proved itself to be different. It was moderately crowded, with some teenaged beings lounging on the tables, some playing darts, and a few chatting it up with the owner; a tall and stocky man in his mid-twenties with a good head of sandy hair and pleasant expression on his face. He had some sort of compassionate charisma to him as he served his patrons, and a slight sense of responsibility to him as he scolded a few of them to not throw the darts at each other's fingers for fun.

A look deeper into the store alerted her that the two people she had been asked to meet that afternoon were sitting amongst the other newsies of the city; Eren playing a game of darts with the tall female newsie with her long brown hair tied up in a pony tail, and Armin relaxing on a chair with his feet stretched out, peepers glued onto one of the newspapers he had yet to sell.

Mikasa walked up plainly, approaching Armin first since he was the only one who didn't have a sharp pointy object in his hands, "Hey."

Armin looked up from his paper and grinned at the sight of his friend, "Hey, you made it!"

"I tried." Mikasa took the empty chair beside Armin and sat down.

Eren noticed her from the corner of his eye, and out of courtesy, turned on his heel briefly from his game of darts to greet her properly, "Glad you're here, Mika."

Her gaze instantly went up to the surrounding newsies around them. Mikasa recognized a good few of them, but not a single name came to her mind when she glanced at them. There was the guy who was as tall as he was sweaty, a large blonde lug of a boy, the same darker haired freckled fellow with an eyepatch, the female newsie playing darts with Eren, and the bald shorter fellow with a gimp leg; his crutch leaning against the wall as he sat on a chair.

Armin was quick to notice the slight dilemma Mikasa could have faced and did his best to help, "Here, I'll introduce you." He pointed around, "That's Bertholdt, Reiner, Marco, Sasha's the one playing darts, and that over there's Connie. Guys, this is my friend…"

"Ackerman," Mikasa interrupted. "Call me Ackerman."

The blonde and stocky one identified as Reiner proved himself to be the most friendly as he flashed Mikasa a grin and held out his hand for a shake, "Nice to meet ya, Ackerman. Arlert here's told us plenty about you. Says you're a reporter."

Mikasa rolled her eyes and flashed Armin a flattered but modest look before looking back to the brawny boy, "If writing on a pad of paper and snapping photos every once in a while counts, then yes, I'm a reporter."

"A reporter, eh? That's swell," Connie remarked from his spot on the seat. "So you write for a real pape' or something?"

She blew some air out of her nose in a grumpy fashion, "Pfft, I wish. I'm trying, at least, does that count?"

"Don't ask too much into it," Eren added as he threw a dart with terrible accuracy. "She'll step on your foot if you get too nosy."

The eye-patched newsie, Marco, let out a humoured chuckle, "Yo, that's kinda ironic for a reporter."

Mikasa was about to reply to Marco's words with a phrase as firm as the hypothetical foot she could slam down on someone else's had she not heard the same familiar voice that she had been hearing way too much in the past while.

"Hey, that was my spot."

Mikasa looked up to see someone she partly hoped that she had seen the end of, but partly hoped she'd talk to again. Speaking to him was surprisingly easy, when she looked back on it now. "You again."

Armin perked up, "Oh, and I think you met him already, but this is Jean."

"I know him," Mikasa confirmed, looking up to the humoured and crooked smile placed on Jean Kirschtein's face.

As usual, he had the unlit cigar placed behind his ear, a trademark becoming just as signature as the cap on a newsboy's head. "Oh, definitely," Jean added onto her confirmation. "I'm sure you know me _very_ well, Ackerman."

The extra emphasis Jean added onto his sentence was enough to garner him a few awkward stares. Armin's bordering on the edge of being flabbergasted, and Eren's embodying plain confusion, a testament to that being the fact that he threw a dart so off course that it hit the wall.

"We ran into each other once, chatted a bit, nothing big," Mikasa confirmed. It did solve lots of the confusion and awkward stares pointed at them.

Jean rolled his eyes with a chuckle as he reached over to snag a chair from a nearby empty table. "Yeah, but who knows, I wouldn't mind getting a private interview with you again, Ackerman."

Chuckles were garnered from most of the newsies, the loudest ones coming from Sasha and Connie.

Before another response could be made, a worker of the store approached the table with two glasses of bubbly water in her hands. She was pale in complexion with her dark hair tied into two loose pigtails, the look on her face seeming very friendly. "Who ordered the seltzer over here?"

Eren stopped throwing darts for a second as Armin put down his paper, both of them replying with the same words: "Me."

She set the two glasses on the table as Armin took out some change from his pocket. "I'll pay for today, Eren."

"Thanks, Armin," Eren grinned in a flattered fashion.

The server nodded her head at Armin's words, "All righty then, Arlert, that'll be 30 cents."

Armin almost dropped his handful of change when he heard the suddenly raised price for a glass of carbonated water. "Whoa, hold on, Mina, 30 cents for two glasses of seltzer? Our total last week was 25 cents!"

Jean nodded his head in agreement, "Yeah, that's more than a paper! That's pretty pricy for some seltzer."

Mina shrugged her shoulders with a bit of apathy, "Sorry, I don't make the prices, guys. I talked to Mr. Berner last week about the prince increase but there ain't a single thing he can do about inflation."

Jean suddenly started rummage around in his pockets, "Relax, Armin, I could spare you some copper." He looked to the remaining newsies, "Guys, got a cent you can spare?"

Sasha, Connie, Marco, Reiner, and Bertholdt all seemed able to separate themselves from a single penny from the confines of their pockets. It was a tiny price to pay, and a penny surely couldn't be missed too much.

"Guys, you don't have too…" Armin insisted worriedly. Eren being stuck in minor debt wasn't horrible, but Armin knew better than to get himself stuck in one as well, even if it was from people who actually had a heart.

"It's fine," Marco assured as he parted with a penny.

"We ain't gonna miss a cent, Arm," Connie said with a smile that spread like butter. "Just forgetta 'bout it."

Armin remained worried as the surrounding newsies filled Mina's open palm with the correct amount of change, and when she left with the proper payment in hand, Armin hesitated to take a sip of his seltzer. "Guys, you didn't have to."

Eren drank from his glass more easily, "It's just a few cents, Armin. And we could pay them back a nickel soon, right?"

"We can," Armin agreed partially. "But inflation's been everywhere these days. What if the price of papers rises? The Star doesn't buy back the issues we don't sell already. If they raise the price of a paper, whether it be for us of for the city, we're gonna have to work harder than before to make the same amount of money."

Jean nodded his head, his eyes seeming just as calculating as his mind, "You know, Arlert's got a point here. It's only a matter of time before inflation gets to the paper's price."

"Or the editor's fat head," Connie snickered, garnering a few chuckles from Sasha.

Bertholdt spoke the first words he spoke in a while, "And it's hard enough for us newsies as is."

Reiner nodded in agreement, "Yeah. We already work our asses off to sell papes at the prices they are now."

Marco added on, "I walk miles and miles every single day and I barely make a dollar!"

"In the snow!" Connie continued.

"Or the rain!" Sasha proclaimed.

"With one foot!" Connie added on again.

Armin got back to his point, "What are we gonna do if Editor Pixis decides to raise them prices then?"

"There's dealing with the lack of profit and starving to death," Marco added on honestly. (Sasha looked at him in horror at the thought.)

Connie's face shifted from being deep in thought into expressing an enthusiastic idea, "OOOOH! OOOH! I KNOW, GUYS! We should fight them! Give 'em the ol' one-two like there ain't no tomorrow!" He held up his crutch happily to imply that the wooden device would become an excellent bludgeoning weapon.

Jean let out an honestly amused chuckle, "Well, that's an option, Springer." He motioned for Connie to put down his crutch gently, "But I don't think the Star's gonna be intimidated by a crip and his crutch."

Sasha grumbled and slumped down in an empty chair, having gotten a little bit excited at the thought of hitting something. "Then whadda we do then, Jeannie-boy? If the inflation thing you say's gonna happen eventually, what are we gonna do if it does?"

Reiner flexed one of his bicep muscles and cracked the knuckles on one of his large hands, "I'm with Connie and Sasha on this, guys. Us newsies is a family, and we don't go down without a fight."

Armin was partly on the same boat as Connie, Sasha, and Reiner, but he begged to differ to an extent, "Who says it has to be a physical fight?" Armin was fully aware that most adults frowned upon youths who messed with the order of things, and those who did were often labelled as 'cruddy JDs' or 'psychologically disturbed.'

He continued onto his first statement, "One thing we could do is strike and fight, and do that _one-two_ thing Connie wants to do. But another thing we could do is just tell the Star that things are hard enough for us as it is."

Marco nodded his head, "Yeah, we could try. But how are we gonna get them to listen? Write them a letter? They wouldn't read anything written by a newsie even if it were the last thing to read on earth."

Jean definitely appeared to agree with Marco's statements about the snobbiness of the Toronto Star, but since his mind was always thinking and calculating, a very bright idea popped into his noggin. "Who says we gotta write a letter?" The familiar sly and crooked smile he commonly sported was seen once more, "What about an article?"

Armin shrugged his shoulders, "I guess, but who'd write it?"

Suddenly, Mikasa was greeted to the sight of 7 heads turning in her general direction and 14 peepers looking straight at her, most of them with very hopeful expressions.

At first, she looked on with a plain face, unaware of what their intentions were. "Why are you guys looking at me like that?" It was only a matter of seconds until Mikasa put together the pieces of the puzzel and realized what the 7 newsies wanted from her. "Oh… OH. You guys want me to…" Some clarification would be needed, "Wait, what exactly do you guys want me to do?"

"Write an article," Jean started, making various motions with his hand. "About us."

"Us?"

Sasha nodded enthusiastically, "Yeah! Us newsies! Don't you know that we's a family. Someone's gotta tell the world what we go through every day."

"But who knows if it'll get published or not?" Mikasa argued. Then again, she hadn't actually sent a story to the Star yet. Her slow progressive journey into being a reporter was only halted because of her lack of story, rather lack of her story getting read, accepted, and published.

"Well, it'd be impossible for it to happen if you didn't even try," Jean added on. "The odds of getting a full-on article into the Star could only get higher if the piece is good enough, and with how much information we could give you for it, I'm sure it'll be better than a gold pocket watch."

Mikasa hesitated just slightly. She always felt as if her first article would probably be something small and simple, a piece only worth being put on the inner pages. But the weight of impact this story could make had a certain chance of being front-page worthy. Could she write it? Was it even possible? Even legal?

Suddenly, Mikasa was realizing how cynical her thoughts were being. Cynicism was not particularly rare for her, but when it came to reporting, it was a career she wanted to happen no matter what.

Was she insane? This was what she was waiting for. Well, this, and the fate of 7 newsies (or more) possibly resting on her hypothetical article.

"If you really think I can do it, then I guess I'll try," Mikasa decided. "But I'd need to interview a few of you guys, just until I have enough to write off of. Maybe next week or so. That okay?"

"It's great," Jean agreed.

"Awesome," said Sasha.

"Perfect," added Connie.

"Excellent," finished Armin.

Mikasa nodded her head in confirmation. "Okay, good then…"

Mikasa hoped that interviewing the city's newsies would be more than enough for her to write a good article with. She probably should have mentioned this to the group, but she had a feeling that as she was progressing through her task, she would have absolutely no clue what she was doing.

* * *

The week of interviewing the city's newsies progressed slowly. Finding the times and places to actually sit down and interview each paper courier was not the hard part, but instead, writing all the damn information down was. Mikasa honestly did not expect each and every newsie to have so much to say. Each and every one of them managed to fill up at least 2 pages in her pocketbook, using up 3 pencils in 4 days during the process.

And some of them weren't even the newsies Mikasa met on the afternoon she met Eren and Armin for lunch. Word seemed to get out that the newsies were going to be given more of a voice than they would ever get in their life times, and lord knew that newsies were great at spreading the news.

But despite all the details being more intricate than the stitchings on her scarf, Mikasa smartly took the time to read all of the notes over at the end of the day, just to get a better idea of what she had to write an article with.

Having low expectations of a bunch of exploited working-class children was not particularly a fault, but underestimating them most definitely made her even more surprised when read what would be the stories behind her story.

Amongst other things, what Mikasa learned from her notes were:

The bald cripple who went by the name of Connie Springer was born with his gimp leg, but kept a very positive attitude as he carried on with his life; pushing through with his signature smile that spread like butter that could turn any lady's head.

Sasha Braus went through certain struggles in her career as a female newsie, but would spend every day enduring it all in order to help her father support their family.

Reiner Braun only sold papers part time. He had a certain dream of his to become a professional boxer, and only worked as a newsie to make some extra cash. On the brighter side, his boxing career was starting slowly, but very surely.

And last, but most certainly not least, the familiar freckled face newsboy with an eyepatch on his right eye, Marco Bodt, took Mikasa's interview with him to tell the story behind his eye patch. Apparently, there was an incident in his past when he was 14 where he got into a scuffle with a newsboy from London and ended up losing an eye in the process. His story sounded very farfetched, but Mikasa wrote it down regardless.

But among all of Mikasa's notes and stories, after looking through them for long enough, she noticed that something was missing in the pages of her pocket book. A reporter could only interview so many people, but Mikasa found it a bit peculiar that the very ashy-haired and cigar-loving newsboy who prompted her to start this project in the first place never even met her once to be interviewed.

In fact, she hadn't even seen him at all as the week went by. Actively searching for him in a city as big as Toronto would definitely re-enforce Jean's one-time assumption that Mikasa was a stalker, but it was undoubtedly out of place for him to not even take part in an article he originally initiated.

As she walked through the city streets on a chilly evening, it was almost like the fates knew that Mikasa had Jean Kirschtein on her mind, because when she turned a corner, Mikasa was only a little bit surprised to find a guy trapped in her thoughts sitting on the first level of a building's fire escape. Jean sat calmly, his thoughts focusing on his task at hand. But for once, that task had nothing to do with the cigar he constantly kept behind his ear. Instead, he had his eyes down on a leather-bound book that was noticeably wide and thin. His fingers were grasped around a pencil, which he kept moving and scribbling on the book's paper. Determination was well mixed into his focus, along with an element of passion as he worked.

Mikasa's original intentions of walking home were currently pushed to the back of her mind, as part of her was convinced that turning the tables and instead being the one to approach him was not a bad idea.

She stood underneath the fire escape's ladder, where he sat with his legs hanging off the edge, "Having fun up there?"

Jean stopped his task and peeped down for a moment, "Oh, good evening, Ackerman. Fancy you being here. What brings your scarf to this neck of the woods?"

"I'm heading back to the Annex now," Mikasa explained. "But you tell me, what are you doing up there?"

"Stuff," Jean responded, his eyes glancing down at his book briefly before looking back at her. He took notice to Mikasa's pocket book, which she held in his hands, and mentally noted that the pages seemed a little more ruffled than usual. "Been writing a lot lately?"

"Of course," Mikasa confirmed. "I'll show you." After slipping the book back into her pocket, Mikasa grabbed onto the bottom bar of the ladder with the help of a few hops, effectively pulling down. When it reached it's end and stood strong, Mikasa found that climbing it was easy, even with the slight raised heel in her shoe.

Jean scooted back a bit and stood up as Mikasa got to the top, slipping his own thin and wide book into his now empty paper sack.

She took her pocket book out once she was safely a top on the metal structure, "I didn't know there were that many of you guys around here."

Jean shrugged shamelessly, "With a city this size, someone's gotta carry the banner."

Opening the book, the intricacy of Mikasa's notes and observations caused Jean's face to change from his usual crooked smile into a look of surprise.

"Shit, Ackerman, a cup of seltzer says that you could earn a freakin' degree in note taking," Jean remarked as a low whistle escaped his lips.

Mikasa nodded, "I won't take you on that bet, but yes, I pride myself in note taking. Though, I admit, I feel like it might not be enough for me to write a decent article out of."

Jean looked at her, eyes open wide in bewilderment, "You're kidding me, right?" With his wide eyes, he peered into the book pages, skimming each word briefly to look it over. He made a humming noise and pointed to one of the paragraphs, "Marco was lying here, he didn't get the eye patch in a fight."

Mikasa turned her book back to her face for a brief second, "He said that his story was true."

"It's not," Jean said in a confident and assured tone of voice. "Nothing bad happened to him, Marco just wears the patch to look cool."

"You're pulling my leg," Mikasa believed.

Jean shook his head, "I never lie, Ackerman."

"I don't believe you."

"It's true." He turned the book to him again, "But on the bright side, at least everything Connie said was true."

"Are you sure?" Mikasa said questioningly. She flipped to the opposite page, where her notes on Connie Springer continued. "Because it says here that you once punched someone in the face for him."

Jean seemed shameless, "That's because I did." He brushed his knuckles with the opposite hand, perhaps recalling the memory as they spoke. "It was a sucker around Dundas street who thought he could snag a pape from him. Dumb crip was too damn slow, so I punched the doofus and got Connie his paper back."

"For a guy who opposed a fight in favour of an article, that's pretty damn violent," she remarked.

"Dickhead deserved it," Jean decided. "Steal shit, get hit."

She rolled her eyes at his comment and moved on, "Tell me this, you." She took a pause, "Why didn't you see me this week for an interview?"

As always, Jean answered honestly, "Well, you know me, don't you? I won't be a newsie of this town forever…"

Mikasa understood very quickly, recalling how passionately and happily this boy had spoke about the seemingly magical city of Vancouver. He spoke of it more fondly than he spoke of anything, but it almost made his goal of reaching the city seem like a dream, like the land was make believe or something. "Right, you're gonna move out to the west. My mistake."

He shrugged, "I just don't see a point in telling my story if I'm gonna be gone eventually."

"You're gonna leave soon?" Mikasa asked.

"Once I got a few more dollars, I'll be out of here to stay," Jean confirmed. "But forget about that for a moment. You gonna get down to writing it soon?"

"I could get it done in a few days," Mikasa predicted. As long as her typewriter was in good shape, she could finish it in a jiffy. She looked at Jean curiously, "But what's it to you though? Aren't you just gonna run off once it's over?"

"Oh, trust me, I will," Jean clarified with a nod of his head. "But I don't think if I could ever go anywhere knowing that every newsie in this town's gonna be treated like utter shit." His expression hardened in worry as he turned away, looking out into the cityscape. "This place isn't too pretty, Ackerman. Plenty of peeps want to come here, and I just wanna leave." He leaned against the rail of the fire escape, "But I better leave it knowing that everyone's gonna be okay."

His words were genuine and true, a compassionate nature coming through as Jean spoke. His eyes told it all. They told his desire to leave, run off, and thrive in a city where the breeze was crisper than an apple and the ocean would make the air fresher than anything a kid could snag at a fruit stand.

But they also told a second need of his, a second need perhaps stronger than the first. She would never guess that a guy like Jean Kirschtein would an ability to care so much about someone that wasn't himself. His entire ambition of moving across the country made his sense of self-preservation seem almost cowardly, but right now, it appeared that Jean's sense of compassion had enough strength to rise about it.

Jean broke the silence that accompanied Mikasa's train of thoughts with his words, "Everyone deserves for their story to be heard in this town. All of them; Connie, Marco, Sasha, Reiner; everyone." He looked at her with the same compassionate face, "I know you can do this."

"I hope I can," Mikasa said honestly. The snapped her pocket book shut as she changed the subject, "I showed you mine, why don't you show me yours?"

Jean raised a suspicious eyebrow, "Wait, what?"

She motioned to the leather-bound book sticking out of his sack, "What's that over there? I didn't know you could write." The tone of her words almost implied that a belief that a person like Jean wouldn't have basic literary skills.

"I can write, but that's not what the book's for," Jean answered.

"What do you do in it then?"

Jean sighed in defeat and reached over to his shack, pulling the book from the fabric confines and handing it to her, "If you really wanna see…"

Mikasa put her own book back into her pocket and took Jean's. For a brief moment, she turned away took look at it without him seeing her reaction. She didn't know what else to expect when looking through the pages when Jean claimed that it wasn't writing, which only made her seem even more surprised when she saw a vast collection of drawings and sketches on each of the book's pages.

The revelation of Jean's artistic talent was, there wasn't much of another word for it, amazing. They were more than just doodles made in somebody's spare time, but genuine art. The lines were drawn gently and precisely, with each bit of shading being perfectly placed. The images were expressed perfectly with every mark and smudge, and there was plenty of them in stock.

There was a fancy looking motorbike in one, a streetcar moving down the lane in another, and even actual portraits of people. Connie and Sasha were smiling happily on one page, Marco and Reiner were leaning against each other in a flamboyant pose in another, and one page that stood out in particular. It could have been just a random woman, but Mikasa noted that she appeared to be older than most of the portraits in the book, about 40, and had more of a subtle smile on her face as opposed to the outright happiness expressed in others.

When Mikasa realized that she had been staring at Jean's work for enough time, she finally spoke, "Wow…"

Jean let out a laugh, "Always the tone of surprise with you, isn't it?"

"These are good," she re-stated, turning to face him with the usual serious looking face. Her expression made her genuine reaction towards her work seem fake, and the monotone in her voice helped out a lot.

"I've been told," shrugged Jean.

"No, they're actually good," Mikasa claimed. She flipped through the pages again, "I didn't know you could draw like this."

"They're just sketches," Jean insisted modestly. "I'm no Picasso or anything."

"Yeah, but you're good," Mikasa said. She looked through the section with a particular amount of portraits and came to the page of the middle aged woman, "Who's this though?"

"That, Ackerman…" Jean started, reaching over to take the book from her. "Is just someone."

"Who is she though?" Mikasa asked once more. She was truly curious on who this person was.

"She's my ma," Jean finally answered, looking down at the drawing with eyes that were either looking glumly or looking fondly. "Or at least, I think it's her. I think that's what a woman like her would look like by now."

Mikasa's eyes widened just a little, "Your mother?"

He nodded, "Yep, that's her; Mama Kirschtein." He closed the book, "It's nothing really though, I was bored one day, Marco said that I should start learning to draw from memory, so I gave this a try."

"It's good though," Mikasa claimed. "But it depends, when was the last time you saw her?"

"8 years ago," Jean answered, slipping his book into his sack.

Mikasa's expression softened just a bit. 8 years ago was one particular year. It definitely made sense that the time Jean saw his mother for the last time and started his career as a newsboy was the same year that the second world war started.

Mikasa had learned the hard way that one of the most horrible things about war was that it left children motherless, fatherless, alone, and orphaned. She was most definitely not the only child that the war had wronged in that manner.

Jean broke the silence accompanying her train of thought for the second time that evening, "When the war started, all she did was tell me that she had to serve her country as a nurse and left."

"Just like that?"

Jean nodded, "Yeah, she left me in at my uncle's. It was a swell place, but I couldn't stand it there. Auruo's cool but he's a fucking ass. Ran away when I was 12 and sold papers to get by. Started living in a hole in the wall that cost 8.50 a month and then just tried to survive."

His last words genuinely surprised her. Most of her notes would have down the fact that plenty of the cities newsies had families and homes to go to at the end of every night, but this newsie, the one who acted like a leader to the group, was the only one who didn't. Even Mikasa had the Jaeger residence in the Annex to come back to, and didn't have to worry entirely about things like rent.

"She never came back?"

"Well…" Jean drew out his words just slightly. "Would you believe that when I was 15, Auruo tracked my ass down to give me a letter from her. Turns out, she settled in Vancouver when the war stopped. She said that if I could come over there myself, I could live with her again. Sure, she's with a new guy who isn't dad, but she's happy there." He let out a sad sigh, "It'd be nice to join her."

The pieces of the puzzle came together faster than an express train to Montreal. The dilemmas of a boy who just wanted to leave shitty town turned into the dilemmas of a boy who just wanted to see someone he kept close to his heart again. It appeared that in addition to those problems, Jean was trapped between his loyalty for two families, one that cared for him just as much as he cared for them, and another who could only relate to him by blood. Blood was thicker than water, after all.

"So that's why you wanna get out of here?" Mikasa asked.

Jean nodded honestly, "Yes."

"Well," Mikasa started, putting a slight slow pause between her word. "I think I know that feel."

Jean looked up.

"My parents aren't here either," Mikasa explained, looking out into the city scape as she spoke. "My dad was a soldier, but he died while serving. And my mom, well, she's Japanese…" She sucked in a breath to keep herself collected, "I think even you'd know how she would've gotten treated a few years ago."

Jean seemed more observant than he appeared with his next statement, "That why you don't want people knowing your first name?"

"Well, people react to _Ackerman_ well," she recalled. She then winced slight at her next claim, "But _Mikasa?_ It gets me a funny look or two." Her voice was reduced to mumbles, "In all honesty, I think the only reason I don't like giving it out is because most of the time, everyone's treated me swell so far. I wouldn't wanna change that."

"Have I treated you differently ever since you told me?" Jean wondered, looking to her with curiosity in her eyes. The answer would entirely be her opinion, after all.

Mikasa had to think back for a moment. From the moment they met, Jean had spoken to Mikasa smoothly, calmly, and with just a little bit of snark. But to the current moment, the only thing that entered their conversations was honesty, hope, dreams, and just a little bit a feeling.

She still had to answer him though, and since he was always honest with her, Mikasa decided to return the favour, "No, you haven't."

The stoicism and monotone in her voice made him question the truth in her words, "Is that a good thing?"

"I'd say so," Mikasa agreed.

"Where's your mom now though?" Jean asked.

"She sort of…" Mikasa started, hesitating to word it in the way she did in her mind. "…died."

Jean looked at her with the same worried and compassionate look he had on before, "I'm sorry."

"She told me she left for my own good," Mikasa recalled, remembering very clearly the day where Mikasa's mom took her to the Jaeger residence and told her that she had to stay there. It was less than a week past Mikasa's 12th birthday, where the last thing given to her was the same camera she snapped photos on today. "Then I never heard from her again."

Jean brought up a different way to see the situation, "If you never heard from her again, then she could be alive."

"She's dead, Jean," Mikasa stated very bluntly, and with the implication tha the subject was not up for debate.

Jean respected her wishes entirely and nodded his head in comprehension.

Mikasa wasn't a fool, she knew the fate of her mother's life from the very thing she tried to dedicate her life to, a newspaper. It was painful for Mikasa to read of the horrors and alienation her mother would have suffered, just because of the actions of others. She also knew that her very life could have been saved from prison camps and deportation by the simple fact that her father was caucasian, and her blood was not entirely Japanese.

When Mikasa shook herself from her thoughts and looked back at Jean, she didn't see a cocky skirt-chasing doll-dizzy newsboy. Instead, who she saw was perhaps one of the only people in the world she was able to be this honest with.

But he also appeared as a boy who saw a lot writing on an article that would come from her hands, and a boy who sincerely had high hopes for the outcome of the piece. The outcome of the piece would also be the deciding factor in whether he saw his mother again, an outcome that could be completely determined by her. It was a lot to hold, but Mikasa was dead set on making things work out.

This time, it was Mikasa who halted her own train of thought and spoke, "Jean?"

He glanced up at her.

"Get ready to see your mother soon," Mikasa stated.

Jean raised an eyebrow, "Hm?"

"Because this article's gonna give every newsie in the city, no, in the province, just what they deserve," Mikasa stated with undoubted denotation and boldness. "Papers being bought back and all."

Jean smiled at her, both impressed and touched, "I believe in you, Mikasa."

"Thank you," Mikasa said with a not, and a very small grin tugging at the corner of her mouth. "Just watch what happens."

* * *

**Concluded in part 3! **

**In addition, my final author's note will be there too.**


	3. Chapter 3

_**And here's the final outcome and conclusion! Hope you like it!**_

* * *

The article was notoriously long, taking up almost 4 pages of paper. But Mikasa had seen news articles much long than that, so it was safe to assume that it could fit in somehow. She wasn't aiming for front page material anyway, the only thing that mattered was getting the story getting out there.

The world would read it and finally know, then the fate of the city's newsies could be changed for the good.

Even with the thought and dedication she put into her work, Mikasa couldn't help but feel nervous as she walked up the steps to the Toronto Star's building. The uncomfortable pang in her stomach only got stronger with every step she took.

When she made it to the top, papers tucked under her arm securely, she was greeted to the desk of a receptionist sitting outside what looked like a much more lavish office. She was most definitely on the floor of the Editor-In-Chief's Office.

The woman behind the desk, who's little name card identified as 'Nifa,' looked at Mikasa with an amused expression, "Oh, honey, are you lost?"

Mikasa shook her head, "No."

"Well, what are you looking for?" Nifa asked.

Before Mikasa could reply, the sound of a grown man's indifferent but stern voice came through a pipe strapped to the wall behind Nifa's desk, the end being bent outwards. It was probably a speaking tube for the Editor to communicate with his receptionist.

_"Nifa, can you send in my 11:30 appointment? An M. Ackerman, if you will."_

Nifa stood and spoke back into the tube, "Yes, Mr. Pixis, right away."

"That'll be me," Mikasa confirmed when Nifa was done speaking. Turning around she approached the door of the Editor-In-Chief's office.

Nifa looked surprised and hurried to stop her, "Wait! Mr. Pixis only makes appointments for reporters only!"

All Mikasa do was reply genuinely. She turned her head and looked Nifa straight in the eye with a glare stronger than the muscles on a construction worker. "I know."

Mikasa opened the office door and closed it just as quickly, leaving Nifa just a little bit confused and very surprised.

* * *

Her life turned back to normal after that day. The appointment went more quickly than she thought, and she had the idea that Mr. Pixis was not entirely sober when he and Mikasa spoke. It was a little bit worrying that a man like him was put in charge of such an esteemed paper, but Mikasa honestly expected him to appear as some sort of power hungry tyrant who only wanted money. Someone who she knew she could demonize and stick it too, but instead, he seemed like nothing more than a man who was simply doing his job. Albeit, not too considerately.

In her experience, those were one of the worst kinds of people. They could be assumed to be cruel, merciless, and ruthless to some. But they would always be humanized in one way or another, to the point where they could be sympathized with. That way, no one could blame them for their faults.

But at least Mr. Pixis seemed like a decent man, and she could only hope that he could find it in his heart to turn a different note towards the newsies of the city.

The bottom line remained that no matter what happened to the prices of the papers, the newsies would will be affected in some way. At the very least, Mikasa made sure that several paragraphs of the article were dedicated to pointing out how better the newsies lives would turn if the Star did the simple act of buying back unsold papers; especially nothing that a paper as profitable as the Star would be able to spare the extra money to those who needed it.

At the moment, Mikasa could only pray that the evening she spent typing on her typewriter until the 3 AM hour hit would make some sort of impact. And she could only hope that Mr. Pixis didn't simply ignore it, because when 2 weeks passed without a single sign of her work in any recent issue, Mikasa started assuming the most negative.

On one afternoon in mid-May, Mikasa found herself following Eren and Armin to Berner's Drugstore. The place was pleasant and quaint, just as usual, with Eren playing a game of cards with Reiner and Sasha on a table, Armin reading as usual (a book this time) with Bertholdt doing the same, and Mikasa herself standing up in front of the dart board, watching Jean retrieve the pointed devices out of the surface for the next round.

"You really suck at darts," Jean remarked as he pulled them off the wall.

Mikasa avoided the temptation to childishly stick out her tongue at him, "Thank you, Jean, I needed that today."

Eren spoke up from his card game, "Ignore her, Kirschtein. She's just bitter that her article's been completely ignored by the Star."

"Wouldn't you guys be as well?" Mikasa brought up as Jean walked back to her position. "I wrote it all just for you anyway."

"Patience is recommended, Ackerman," Jean informed as he held the darts in his fingers and pulled his hand back for a throw. "How do you think I managed to get even half of my funds to get to Van?" He threw a dart with much better aim that she had.

"I know it is," Mikasa admitted. "But I swear, if Pixis just threw my stuff in the trash can just because he didn't expect me to be… me." She looked down at the darts in Jean's hands, "…I just might find a better use for these."

"My dear Ackerman, I learned recently that violence is not in fact the first answer, but the second to last," Sasha added on. Then again, she wasn't one to talk considering how many scuffles she got into with the tall freckled girl who lived next door to her. Something about calling knees scabby seemed to draw the girl into a fight.

Mikasa rolled her eyes at Sasha and glanced back to Jean as he threw the darts, "Hey, speaking of funds, how much do you have so far?"

"I have…" Jean threw a dart. "…enough."

"Enough?"

"Enough to be hitting the road soon," Jean theorized. "But I promise you, I'm only gonna leave once the story gets out there." He threw the last dart, "Even if it takes two weeks or two months."

Walking back to the board, Mikasa retrieved the darts and took them into her own hands.

Armin spoke up from his spot on the table, "Are you really leaving the city, Jean?"

Jean nodded his head, "Armin, I've been saving up for over 2 years for this. I've come too far to give up."

He was stubborn, that was for sure.

"We're gonna miss you, buddy," Reiner remarked, looking away from him, Eren and Sasha's card game. "Toronto ain't gonna be the same without you."

Sasha nodded and agreed, "Yeah, who's gonna be our leader then?"

"There's Marco," Jean suggested.

The visible cringing and wincing on everyone's faces was very noticeable. Mikasa had only spent a little bit of time with the freckled Bodt boy, but she did get the idea that he was way too naive for his own good. Could that translate into bad leadership skills? Perhaps. He was definitely less observant than Jean, and seemed to take a little longer to think of ideas and solutions than Jean could.

"Marco ain't nothing like you," Sasha insisted.

Jean did his best to look modest, "I'm sure you guys could survive without me."

The bell on the door of the Drugstore rung louder than necessary when the door moved against it, indicating that who ever was entering had to come in very very quickly.

Almost everyone in the shop turned to see who came in. It was Marco, eye covered by his patch as expected, and Connie, limping forward with his crutch at a faster pace than usual. They seemed ecstatic and excited, Marco with this almost maniacal gleam in his eye and Connie with a smile wider than a city street.

"HEY, GUYS!" Connie exclaimed as he limped through the store. "GUYS. GUYS. GUYS. GUYS. GUUUUYYYYYSSSSSSSSS!"

Going with Connie's new habit of yelling, Jean decided to show Connie the same courtesy, "CONNIE. CONNIE. CONNIE. CONNIE. CONNIEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

Connie was still yelling, "GUYS, DID YOU SEE THE AFTERNOON EDITION?"

"No," Armin answered, checking the store's clock. "It just came out didn't it?"

Marco turned to Mikasa and held up a freshly printed paper, "Mikasa! They published your article!"

"WHAT!?" Mikasa had exclaimed more loudly than she ever did in her life. It was so much of a shock for her to scream like this, even Eren and Armin were startled.

Ignoring the volume of her scream, Mikasa dashed over to Marco and took the paper from his hands, looking at it hastily. She expected to spend a few seconds flipping through the pages to get to the article, but there was no need, because to her utter shock, her article was on the front page.

Mikasa almost screamed again, but lucky for anyone who valued their ears, she didn't. "It's on the front page?!"

Armin hopped up from his seat and looked over Mikasa's shoulder at the paper, "Whoa! It is! Guys! Look!"

The group of couriers stood up and all peeped over Mikasa's shoulder to look at the article.

Reiner read the headline out loud, "**The News Behind The News: The Story Of Toronto's Newsies** Hm, good headline."

Mikasa looked over the entire body, searching for possible edits and re-writes. But to her surprise, it was all in tact, aside from a few spelling errors she couldn't correct entirely. "I actually can't believe it, it's all here!"

"Here here, lemme read it out loud," Bertholdt spoke up, taking the paper from Mikasa's grasp.

"It's pretty long," Mikasa reminded. "Just read a bit."

Bertholdt nodded and searched the page for an excerpt worthy enough to be read out loud: "_Genuine sources say that the average newsboy works just as hard as the average mill worker, with a wage that is much lower. A price inflation of the average issue would be nothing near beneficial to the average newsies, as the fact remains that they would have to work twice as hard to make half of their original profit. And with a policy refusing to buy back unsold papers at the end of the day, a boneheaded newsie could easily end up having much less money at the end of the day than they did at the start." _

Eren looked offended, "Hey! Am I the boneheaded newsie?"

Jean shot him a bit of a glare and motioned for him to shut up and keep listening.

Bertholdt continued: _"The Toronto Star is a very esteemed and popular newspaper, and the possibility of the company policy of not buying back papers being removed would not end with the Star losing money. With a small bit of money sacrificed, the newsies of the town would have a much more dependable wage to live off of, and while nothing could help the occasionally harsh working conditions they go through on a daily basis, it would definitely make trudging through the rain and delivering in the snow much more worth it." _

When Bertholdt finished reading, Sasha looked bewildered, "Holy shit, Ackerman. I can't believe that this made the front page."

"You know what this means?" Marco said, excited. "It means that the city's gonna know our story! We'll be famous! Popular! Worth something!"

"But we ain't rich or anything," Connie added. "They ain't gonna ever pay attention to little old us. We're not worth it."

"So?" Reiner asked, looking at Connie in disbelief. "You don't need money to be famous. All you need is your face on the front page, and with that, even a crip like yourself could be this city's king!"

Connie smiled warmly at the thought of a boy like him being given such a title, "Picture me, guys; king."

Jean looked down at the bottom of the paragraph, "Hey, Bert, read this part."

"Okay," Bertholdt agreed. _"A personal message from Dot Pixis to all the city's newsies: I am fully aware that a fair amount of you provided the research notes to this reporter to properly write a well made paragraph, and that being said, the persuasiveness of this reporter has convinced me to consider the possibility to cutting the Star's policy of not buying back unsold papers." _

A collective gasp between the newsies was exchanged, every look on their dusty but youthful faces was genuine surprise and hope for the better.

"Good merciful lord," Marco said, flabbergasted.

"I know, I KNOW!" Sasha almost screamed. She turned to Mikasa with very pleased eyes, "Ackerman! I know you were a good writer, but I never ever thought someone like you would get this far with an article!"

Mikasa tried to look modest, "Well, I gave it my all."

"There's more! There's more!" Bertholdt claimed. _"That being said, on the afternoon of June 1st, I invite all news couriers of Toronto to tune into the CBC radio broadcast. Only then shall I put my foot down on my decision on whether or not I'll raise the policy. Remember, 2:30 PM sharp. See you there."_

"But you know what this means, don't you?" Reiner said. "This is the first step for the newsies of Toronto to finally get something incredible!"

"We need to celebrate!" Connie insisted happily. "How's about we head up to Jinn's uptown? He's open for celebrating anything that comes his way!" Berner's place was definitely more of a relaxing kind of joint, as oppose to a celebrating one.

"It's just a possibility, guys," Mikasa reminded with her eyes low on the ground. But before she knew it, she heard the collective cheers of enthusiasm around her, and right as she looked up, the newsies surrounding her were all getting up and heading off to the door of the drugstore. The bell's jingles played along with the cheers of the newsies, which admittedly, Mikasa found very amusing.

Rolling her eyes, Mikasa noticed the dropped paper on the floor of the store and picked it up. As she folded it properly, she quickly took notice to one certain newsboy who was still present in the shop. "Oh, you're still here?"

Jean laughed, "I wanted to run with them, but I needed to say something." He gave her a friendly smile, "Congrats on your article, Ackerman. Or uh… Mikasa." He took a slight pause in his words, "You know, maybe I should start calling you Mikasa full time now."

"Call me what you want," she suggested. "And thanks, it means a lot coming from you."

"You actually persuaded Pixis's mind with it," Jean stated. "I mean, he's at least considering cutting the policy. That's big shit, man."

"Definitely, but I guess that just means you'll run off to Vancouver even sooner," Mikasa muttered, almost bitterly.

Jean seemed humoured, "It does. But why does me running off out west got you so bothered, Ackerman?"

Mikasa shrugged and looked down, keeping her eyes focused on placing the paper back into her coat's inside pockets. "I have my reasons…"

"And may I know what they are?" Jean requested in a professional sounding voice.

Mikasa could tell that he was looking for an honest answer. The honesty he always showcased to her definitely had a price. But expecting her to be just as honest as he was to her wash not entirely too bad, in Mikasa's opinion, at least. Mikasa finished putting the paper in her coat pocket and glanced up at him. For a reason she couldn't pin point, Mikasa knew exactly what to say. The thing was, she had no idea how to say it. The words were right in her mind, but she got the feeling that actually getting them to come out would take some effort. Or time.

Perhaps she took more time as usual, because the second, Mikasa's mouth managed to move, the bell of the store's door rung again, garnering the attention of the dusty newsboy and newly acclaimed reporter.

Connie stood at the store's door, crutch and backwards news cap and all, "Hey! Aren't you guys coming with?"

Jean had his mouth pressed into a straight line, noticeably bothered that the answer to his question was cut off by a crippled kid. He didn't let himself get too bothered though, as he spared Mikasa a quick glance before answering Connie's question. "Yeah, we are."

"What he said," Mikasa brushed off as she motioned to the front of the store. "Lets get going."

With enough spoken, the company of the two newsboys, one crippled and one abled, left the Berner drugstore with a red scarfed reporter in tow.

* * *

In a factual sense, Mikasa knew that the outcome of Editor Pixis's choice would not effect her too much. It was very impossible for her to just let the man say his choice on live radio and go on with her life as usual, no matter what the bottom line would be.

But in the same factual sense, it was in fact her article that sparked the whole reconsideration in the first place. It would only make sense that she was concerned about something she practically started having a beneficial impact.

So much rode on her article in the first place, and so much more rode on the effect of her article. The fate of a group of exploited youths was either going to change for the better or remain in it's currently unfair state. With all of that being considered, it was no wonder that Mikasa was practically running down city street on the afternoon of June 1st.

Behind her, Mikasa's hands were grasped on the shirt sleeves belonging to Eren and Armin, holding on strong enough for her to effectively pull them as she dashed.

"Mika! You're gonna rip my shirt!" Eren cried as Mikasa kept on running. She had always been stronger than the scrawnier boy ever since they met. Perhaps it was in the genes.

"Really! Slow down!" Armin nearly begged, yet, despite him being concerned that his closest female friend just might pull his arm out of the sockets, he seemed just a little amused with Mikasa's eagerness to get over to Berner's Drugstore, where she promised the other newsies that she would listen to Pixis's bottom line with them. "It's 2:20! We've got time!"

Mikasa knew, she knew very well, but it still didn't slow down the speed of her dash. She didn't want to miss Pixis's announcement, no matter what.

But still, by the time the trio of kids made it to block where Berner's was, Eren felt a remarkable aching pain in his shoulder, even after Mikasa let go of him hand.

Sucking in a breath, Mikasa took long strides on the sidewalk as she stepped towards the store's entrance. She opened the door quickly, ringing the bell loudly. As expected, the place was filled up with newsies, but to her surprise, there were more. Plenty, tons, dozens of them; all of them being identified as so with the signature news caps placed on their heads.

She recognized a certain few, like Reiner and Marco, and of course, Jean, whom was sitting calmly by the drugstore's counter with his usual unlit cigar hanging out of his mouth, but there were others as well. For starters, there was a taller stocky newsie with tanned skin and short brown hair, who seemed to be holding the hand of a young freckled red head who was flashing him a look of assurance. And a blonde haired newsie who looked an awful lot like a shorter version of Reiner.

While she wondered if a product of her own creation could spark this much of an impact, Mikasa made her way towards the counter, right beside Jean's spot. "Did they announce it yet?"

Jean turned his head towards her, seeming just a little bit happier when he realized who just happened to take the seat next to him, "Ackerman, nice to see you too. And no, they didn't."

Armin had managed to push himself through the store's patrons, right beside Mikasa. Though, he couldn't find a seat. "Hey, Jean, listening too?"

"I gotta," Jean replied, taking his cigar out of his mouth and holding it between his fingers. "Plus, why not?"

Nodding in agreement, Armin let his gaze move elsewhere, towards the radio Berner commonly kept on a shelf in the corner of the store. Mina was on her shift that day, and was currently fiddling with the radio's settings to get it to the proper station.

Jean spoke up to her from his spot, "Hey, Carolina, how's it coming?"

"Just trying to get it at the right station," Mina answered, doing her best to keep her mind on her task. Getting it to CBC's radio station was definitely her number 1 priority at the moment. "How does it sound guys? Good? Fuzzy?"

Sasha spoke up from across the room, which was all the way in the corner, "We can hear it from here! No worries!"

With a nod of her head, Mina took her hands away from the device and left it as it is.

"And hey, Mina, think you could get me a glass of seltzer please?" Armin requested when the worker stepped away from the piece of tech. "I'll pay it myself this time."

Mina chuckled in an amused fashion and nodded, "Of course, Arlert. Coming up."

"Make it two," Mikasa added. With her order said, Mikasa took out her pocket watch and checked the time. "2:26, 4 minutes."

"Gee, you're pretty damn riled up about this," Jean remarked, resting his cigar on the counter surface, next to an empty glass with melting ice at the bottom.

"Am I not allowed to be?" Mikasa questioned. "It was my article that started this all."

"I know, but why do you care so much? It isn't gonna effect you in anyway," Jean pointed out. It was an awfully valid point to say. "I mean, 2 months ago, you wouldn't look another newsie in the eye that wasn't Jaeger or Coconut Head, what gives now?"

"I just wanna know that what I made did something," Mikasa started. The time was 2:27, and by then, Mina had delivered two glasses of seltzer to the counter. Armin took one and Mikasa took the other. "Who knows when I'll get another chance to write in The Star?"

"Mikasa, don't-_hic!_ …Think like that," Armin said through sips of seltzer. "You're a good writer."

Mikasa could only roll her eyes as she took a pull from her own glass, "Yeah, keep on saying that…" She put the glass down, "Besides, what else could I write about that would garner this much attention?"

"There's the weather," Armin brought up innocently. "Or the state of the city's buildings."

"This city's a big place," Jean reminded. "There are stories everywhere, you just gotta look."

"From what I've heard, Vancouver's no bigger," Mikasa started. Somehow, she always found a way to relate her conversations with Jean back to that particular subject. "What news do you think goes on there?"

Jean let out a slight chortle, "Always bringing ourselves back to that topic, aren't we?" He shrugged honestly, "Dunno. But hey, forget about me for a second, can you?"

The time was now 2:28.

"I'll try," Mikasa agreed. "But tell me this, you ever thought of becoming an artist?"

"Like a fancy-ass painter or a snobby sketcher?" Jean begged for clarification.

"Any kind," Mikasa re-stated.

Jean shrugged, "That would require actually being a good artist, you know."

"Well, you're not a terrible artist," Mikasa remarked honestly. "I don't see why it can't be a career option for you in the future. And you stated it yourself, you can't be a newsie forever."

"Yeah," Jean started, his voice lowering to a grumble. "But that's probably all I'm inclined to do."

The time was now 2:29.

"Besides," Jean continued. "All I do is sketch random shit. I don't do anything big like what you do. Nobody looks at a grubby boy on the street and expects him to be anything. You certainly didn't."

Mikasa looked down, sucking in a breath silently and slowly, "Oh, yeah…" The expectations she had of him, and of most newsboys in general, were low, even she could admit it. Though, after being exposed to the newsboys this much, Mikasa's low expectations for the city's newsies had most definitely risen higher than she thought it could. "I shouldn't have thought like that though."

The time was now 2:30.

There wasn't much time before the news article starting for Mina to shush everyone in the shop to tell them to listen, but at least by the time everyone quieted down and she turned up the volume, the words of the host managed to come through.

_"… and now, on air, we have Dot Pixis, the Editor-In-Chief at the Toronto Star, here to bring a special message he promised to the city's local news couriers. Mr. Pixis, you're on." _

The voice changed from a calm sounding fellow in their mid-twenties to the near indifferent sigh of an old man, the same indifferent sigh Mikasa could remember being in an appointment with several weeks ago.

_"Thank you, Mr. Zacharius. Now, if few could recall, in the afternoon edition of the Star published on May 16th, I made a promise to put my foot down on my decision regarding the paper buy-back policy." _

Mikasa took a deep breath as the sudden feeling of pressures pushing down on her settled into her mind set. She clenched her fist around her seltzer glass, holding it tighter than she thought she could.

_"Now, the article that caused me to persuade my consideration was written by a peculiar and unknown author writing her first piece to be submitted to the big leagues…" _

Armin beamed more than Mikasa did and placed his hand on her shoulder proudly.

_"… and while it did take me a while to actually get it published, that was only because it made me think about the policy for so long._"

Jean nudged Mikasa playfully, shooting her a warm smile when she glanced over at him.

_"To sum every thing up, I found it surprising that one piece of work could tell so many stories; so many stories of the labourers who work hard, suffer, and push themselves like nothing else for little pay just so my paper could get around." _

"Yeesh, just get on with it already," Mikasa spoke up, finding herself slowly getting annoyed with Pixis's habit of drawing out his sentences longer than usual.

_"And now, because of what I've been told, my final decision shall remain…" _

"I bet he just built up everyone's expectations so they would get crushed him saying no," Mikasa mumbled.

_"… that the Toronto Star will be buying back the unsold papers from now on. Back to you, Mr. Zacharius." _

Initially, Mikasa's reaction to the revelation was much different from the other reactions shared between most other people in the store. Because all Mikasa could do was stop and stare blankly for a moment, realizing that she needed a moment to comprehend what had just happened.

But every other patron in the store reacted much differently, because what accompanied Mikasa's moment of stopping and staring was nothing short of the sound of roaring cheers; cheers so loud that there was a good chance that the entire west side of the city heard them coming from the little drugstore. Arms were up in the air, caps were up in the air, soaring higher than the triumphant yells of joy.

Bertholdt had stood up and pulled the closest people into a bear hug, those people being Eren and Marco, showing more happiness than he ever showed in the last few months. Connie was up in the air, as Reiner had reached over to him and hoisted the cripple up onto his shoulders, both of them whooping like the overjoyed dorks they were. Sasha was hopping erratically, not even bothering to hug someone as she praised god with all the power of her voice. She did happen to jump on the closest thing in range, that closest thing happening to be poor Armin.

And heck, even Mr. Berner, the store's owner, was showing a reaction. There was definitely a reason why he seemed to be in a constant struggle to keep himself calm, because as he jumped up and down in triumph, he hugged Mina very closely, almost squeezing his more tighter for anyone's comfort.

Mikasa could only stop and stare for so long, because she was quickly shaken out of her shock when she felt a pair of strong arms wrapping around her from her left side. Mikasa knew that there was only one person she knew who was sitting on her left side, and she didn't even need to look to know who it was.

Jean was hugging her. It wasn't awkward, it wasn't weird, it was just a hug. All he really did was hold her closely as the moment passed. No obnoxious whooping, or loud cheering, just a simple hug, tight but gentle. No one would see, and she would make sure that no one could find out, but somehow, Mikasa found herself smiling just a little bit.

"You did it!" Jean said. "You did it, Mikasa!"

"Well, we did it," Mikasa re-stated modestly, untangling herself out of the embrace of Jean's arms. "You're the one who asked me to write the piece in the first place."

"If you insist," Jean accepted, patting her on the shoulder proudly. "Still, can't believe that you actually did it, you gave every the extra profit they all deserve! Every newsie in the town!"

"Just the ones around here," Mikasa corrected.

Jean then sucked in a sigh, letting the ultimate truth that he knew was going to pop up finally get acknowledged, "Well, I guess this is it then. Everything's been settled now, I better hit the road soon."

"Why so quickly though?" Mikasa begged to question, genuinely curious.

Before Jean answered, he heard some familiar voices coming towards him from behind.

"Yeah, Jeannie-Boy!" Sasha said in a whine-like tone. "Are you really gonna go?"

Reiner pouted, "We're gonna miss you like hell, buddy."

"Definitely," Armin added on. Looking over to his darker-haired friend, Armin elbowed Eren just slightly.

"Wha- Oh! Yeah," Eren stuttered, pulling himself back into the topic. "Yeah, we're gonna totally miss you, Kirschtein."

"I don't get it, what does Vancouver have that Toronto don't?" Marco asked, looking at his friend with a sad look.

"The better question is," Mikasa started, looking Jean in the eye with a curious glance. "What does Toronto have that Vancouver doesn't?"

"Toronto has us," Connie answered smartly, motioning to everyone from his higher position modestly.

Sasha nodded her head quickly, "Yeah, Jeannie. Don't you know that we's a family?"

"And I don't think I'd be able to write another article with you across the country," Mikasa added. She tried to be modest in what she attempted to imply, but instead, she came off as more needy than she intended too.

Jean turned his head and peered down on her, a humoured crooked grin on his face, "What do you mean by that?"

"I'm just saying," Mikasa added on, touching Jean's shoulder with her hand. "I'm gonna need someone to tell me to write another hit article. Who else is gonna do that? Eren?" She couldn't really depend on Eren to motivate her to write, since the last time he asked her to write something for him involved her writing about cheese.

"Do you really?" he wondered, truly curious and almost flattered.

"Really," she confirmed with affirmation.

"I see your points, guys. All of them," Jean said observantly. His eyes glanced upon everyone; to Eren's plain expression to Connie and Sasha's hopeful gleam that Jean would in fact stay with them in Toronto. But looking at them now, Jean knew he would miss them all just as much as they would miss him. He'd miss Connie's optimistic smile every morning, Sasha's enthusiasm with the afternoon edition, and even Armin's ramblings of books he was reading. He'd miss it all, and the fact would always remain that while Vancouver had his parents, Toronto had his family.

People who acted more like a family to him than people who were related to Jean by blood.

In this moment, it was like his dreams came true. All the work he had put into his career and future could pay off right then and there. But it was almost as if his eyes had cleared up, and it turned out that his dreams were average sized. Smaller than he thought. Dreaming of moving to Vancouver seemed smaller than he thought, and a dream like that would no doubt feel like nothing if he didn't have people to share them with.

"I guess I could stay for a bit," Jean finally said.

Connie's face lit up, "Really?!"

"Just for a while," Jean stated, nodding his head. "Besides, I think I've found someone who's gonna make it harder for me to leave now." He flashed Mikasa a warm smile through a friendly glance.

She couldn't hide her grin this time, because he looked at her so genuinely and warmly that she couldn't help but empathize.

She didn't want him to leave, and he didn't want to leave her. The feeling was practically mutual; a relationship of not wanting each other to go so far finally seeing the light and the possibility to exist.

Jean took her hand, his calloused thumb rubbing against her smooth palm.

"I think I'd miss surprising you every day, Mikasa," Jean added on, a joking gleam in his gaze.

Mikasa could not help but roll her eyes, "You don't surprise me every day."

"I do," Jean stated almost smugly. He insisted that he never told lies plenty of times for her to know it.

The original retort to his words in her head was something witty and snippy, but the only reason Mikasa halted her statements was because suddenly, she thought of a much better way to respond.

In her mind, actions never really spoke louder than words, but she could tell that the act of her reaching over, placing one hand on his shoulder and one on the back of his neck, she was definitely saying something strong. "Then how about I turn the tables?"

Jean didn't even have a second to raise an eyebrow before he realized what was happening, because in mere moments, he was suddenly greeted to the feeling of Mikasa Ackerman kissing him full on the mouth. And when he managed to regain himself and realize that she was doing this willingly, he happily responded with just as much enthusiasm.

She was correct, the tables had turned, and for once, Jean was the one who ended up exceedingly surprised.

From that day on, Vancouver would definitely have something that Toronto didn't.

But Toronto had her.

* * *

**This concludes my one and only piece of work for Jeankasa week. I truly hope that you enjoyed it, and if you did, I'd love it if you left a review.**

**It definitely took a large chunk of my time to write this, but all in all, I think it worked out okay. I researched, wrote, and revised a lot, and I truly hope that it actually paid off.**

**I also hope that calling Jeankasa 'Horsecuddles' now is going to start catching on with this fic. It's a bit of an inside newsies-fan joke, but even if you don't get it, HORSECUDDLES, MAN. **

**All right, hope you had fun. Bye!**


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